Silent Hill

The Good
Silent Hill, released in early 1999, went unnoticed before its release with very little hype.However, when it was released, people started buying it. Now it stands as one of the playstation's greatest hits and personally, on my top 5 games of all time list.

Silent Hill is about a man named Harry Mason who is taking a vacation to Silent Hill with his daughter. A mysterious woman passes in front of his car and he drives off the road and gets knocked unconcious. When he wakes up, his daughter is gone. You must find out where she is and what happened to her.

Silent Hill has one of the greatest plot's in video game history. The story has plenty of twists and turns that keep you guessing. There are no shortage of puzzles that will boggle your mind but will also keep you interested in the game. This game has the perfect mix of strategy, mystery, and action. Almost everything about this game is great. Konami created a horror masterpiece that will forever be remembered as the game that knocked the Resident Evil series off it's throne.

The Bad
I loved everything. Nothing of this game was bad.

The Bottom Line
Final Score: 9.8/10

Truly one of the best games ever made. A masterpiece.

The Good
The atmosphere is undoubtedly my favourite part in Silent Hill. And to it there are three main contributors – the soundtrack (a horror piece in itself), the setting and the plot. The soundtrack is so eerily creepy that even standing still while listening to it can give me the creeps. The setting is wonderfully done, at all times conveying a feeling of loneliness and despair, with beautifully arranged camera angles – very cinematic indeed. The graphics, (even though they haven’t aged very well), still convey the message Silent Hill is trying to pass on, with the transitions between worlds very cleverly done. Finally, the plot is outstanding, making you gather bits of it throughout the game in order to fully comprehend what has come to pass – when I finally got it all, I was simply blown away.

The Bad
The gameplay in Silent Hill is, sadly, its weakest point. The controls are incredibly sluggish, and moving Harry around is not only a challenge but also very annoying, to the point where running from enemies seems much more tempting than to simply try and face them. I hate trying to shoot an enemy and suddenly finding myself with my back to them, without knowing why. And of course, one cannot mention Silent Hill’s flaws without referencing the god-awful voice acting – it is no Resident Evil by any means (“NO, DON’T GO!”…ugh), but it still sounds incredibly cheesy, and it doesn’t look like the actors are even trying (particularly in Harry’s case).

The Bottom Line
This game was the first of its kind to truly tackle horror from the psychological perspective, and able to do it successfully. If you have the patience to deal with the cumbersome controls, it is a must-play of the horror genre, and would have been the best of the series if not for its immediate sequel, Silent Hill 2.

The Good
Since I have beaten all of them, 1-4, I understand the story behind, and I love it. This game is the scariest game you will ever play. It makes Resident Evil 4 look like a game for babies.The graphics on the PlayStaTion add to the effect of the overall experiance, because everything looks so gruesome and just plain BAD that you can't tell what it is, and that makes it scary. Also, the music will adds to the experiance with ambient sound effects and cool piano and guitar tunes (but throughout the playing of the game, the music is creepy sounding.) I love the movie graphics and the out loud talking. I really don't care about weapons, but it has a lot for a game that you could beat in a day.

The Bad
The fact that you have to have an audiance behind you to be able to turn the PlayStation on (at least I did.) I could not go to the bathroom for weeks after visiting the bathroom stall in the Elementary School. This game is a little too scary, even for 18+, even though I not even that old yet. Also, this game's puzzles kept me playing for hours. Especially the one in the dungeon of Nowhere.

The Bottom Line
The best Survival Horror game on the face of the earth. You havn't felt true fear until you have played this game.